Connecting a USB stick to the mains is absurd because we are not going to enter or retrieve data from the electrical network. We are also not going to recharge the battery of this device because it does not need it either. However, it's one of those strange and curious experiences. Is it going to explode? Is it going to break down?
We've already told you that neither of these things happened, although technically something could happen that makes it useless. So we don't recommend testing it or not, at least with any charger. The key to everything is to use a original Apple power adapter or, failing that, it has quality certificates (for example, the MFi provided by Apple itself).
What did we need for this experiment?
A priori we only need a single USB stick and a power adapter, but since this was very boring and we wanted to cover more options, we chose to use several of each. In all, three USB sticks, three power adapters and a USB-A to USB-C adapterwhich is necessary given that the memories are all USB-A.
Where there are differences is in the power adapters I used for these tests:
- 5W USB-A adapter. This is the old Apple adapter that came in the box with iPhone 11 and earlier.
- 67W USB-C adapter. This is the one I use to recharge the battery of my MacBook Air M1.
- 20W USB-C adapter. This is the one recommended for charging the most recent iPhones and which I use on my iPhone 16 Plus.
Finally, the memory that USB sticks had. That doesn't matter for this experiment, but now that I explain it, I'll ease curiosity by saying that two of them were 32 GB and another was 8 GB. However, I insist that it is not important for this experience.
What happened when we connected the USB sticks to the chargers
We tried all possible combinations USB stick with the different adapters we had. In the case of USB-C adapters, we had to put the USB-A to USB-C adapter as an intermediate piece. And the truth is that in no case did anything extraordinary happen.
Well, yes, something happened. The flash drive light came onproof that they were receiving food. Beyond that, we did not observe any notable facts. There was no surprise as incredible as suddenly opening a giant monitor on the wall to see the files on the USB drives. Nothing caught fire or there was a short circuit that knocked out the power.
However, the conclusion of our experiment is not this, but a very different conclusion and one in which we support our recommendation not to try this at home. Or at least, not at all.
There is a real risk with these experiments
You may be wondering Why weren't the USB drives damaged or burned inside?. The answer to this question is that power adapters are able to adapt their power output to the circumstances. In other words, depending on the connected device, they will provide more or less energy.
USB drives require power, but it is minimal. Thus, the adapters deliver the minimum possible when they detect them. Or rather, when it does not detect them, given that as they are not devices ready to connect to the mains, the adapter does not recognize them and for security reasons it also delivers the minimum.
However, yes there may be a risk if poor quality power adapters are usedeither because they lack safety certificates or because they are damaged. As if they were connected to a faulty power grid. In these cases, the USB drive could receive additional energy which would eventually ruin them and make them uselessthus losing all stored data and, of course, preventing new ones from loading.
What is practically impossible is for this to reach catch fire or explode. This is mainly because USB drives do not have a battery, which is the most dangerous component in these types of experiments, as they can swell from excess heat.
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